8TB Enterprise Hard Drive: Helium or Air, and Which Part Number to Look For

Enterprise hard drive 8TB: helium and air designs side by side

Calling 8 TB the older air-filled size would be wrong. Helium and air designs both reach it. Seagate's Exos X10 sheet answers Yes on its helium sealed-drive row for the 8 TB models, and WD places the Ultrastar DC HC510 in its helium-filled HC500 series. WD builds the HC320 on a five-disk air platform, and marks both 8 TB WD Gold parts as Air. The 7E10 and 7E8 sheets we read say neither air nor helium, so we do not place them on either side.

The clearest comparison stays within one maker. On SATA, WD states 5.0 W for the helium HC510, on a line it shares across 10 TB and 8 TB, and 7.4 W for the air HC320. That 2.4 W over 8,760 hours is about 21 kWh per drive per year at idle. The sum is ours, on WD's figures, and takes no account of load. Multiply it by your drive count and your tariff.

WD's Gold sheet shows the same split as an efficiency index. WD8005FRYZ, marked Air, prints 0.84 W/TB idle, against 0.35 W/TB for the 16 TB model, marked Helium. WD8006FRYZ prints 1.2, but its own 6.5 W over 8 TB works out at about 0.81, so that cell does not follow from the sheet's idle figure.

Reliability ratings divide too. Seagate rates the X10 at 2,500,000 hours MTBF and WD rates the HC510 at 2.5M hours, whilst the 7E10, the 7E8 and the HC320 are rated at 2 million. Those are maker ratings for a family, not a forecast for one drive.

8TB enterprise hard disk price on Amazon.co.uk

At the last price check, the table held 17 listings in stock. Lowest price per TB at the last check: £24.75/TB. Prices are in pounds sterling inc VAT.

The table cannot tell you which design you are getting. Take the part number from a row and find it in the tables on this page. The Recording column prints a technology only where a maker document covers that number, and a CMR claim in an Amazon title remains the seller's claim.

Seagate 8TB enterprise hard drive: three Exos lines

On the Exos 7E10, the standard 8 TB SATA number is ST8000NM017B. The PowerBalance number sits in the same SATA table as a separate part, so check which one a listing actually names. The table prints one idle row per capacity, not a separate one for PowerBalance.

Sector format narrows the choice at this size. On the 7E8 sheet, 8 TB appears in the 512e and 4Kn tables and not in the 512n ones. The 7E10's 8 TB drive likewise sits in its 512e/4KN tables, and that sheet's 512n SATA table runs from 6 TB downwards. If a legacy system needs native 512-byte sectors, 8 TB on these two lines is the wrong starting point: the 4 TB enterprise page covers those models.

Weights differ across the three: 650 g for the X10, 716 g for the 8 TB 7E10 and 780 g for the 8 TB 7E8. The 7E10 family also carries a 550TB per year workload rating, which Seagate puts at ten times a desktop hard drive.

Ultrastar and WD Gold at 8 TB: reading the model numbers

The HC510 sheet covers 10 TB and 8 TB at 7200 RPM, over SATA 6Gb/s and SAS 12Gb/s, and gives its part numbers in wildcard form. In its key, xx is the capacity, 10 for 10 TB and 08 for 8 TB, so a number with 10 in that position is not this drive. E6 is 512e SATA and 42 is 4Kn SAS, and the sheet also prints N6 for 4Kn SATA (HUH7210xxALN60y) and 52 for 512e SAS (HUH7210xxAL520y). If a listing does not show the full number, ask before you buy.

WD's Gold sheet has two 8 TB parts in different tables. WD8006FRYZ idles at 6.5 W and WD8005FRYZ at 6.7 W, so the choice barely moves power. Its title describes an Enterprise Class SATA HDD, which is why no SAS Gold number appears above.

We have not been able to read a Toshiba 8 TB document, so we give no Toshiba specification at this size, whatever the table may show. Family detail lives on the WD Ultrastar and Seagate Exos pages.

SAS listings at 8 TB, and what SAS adds at idle

PowerBalance and hyperscale parts at 8 TB are SATA only on these sheets, so a SAS system narrows you to the standard numbers. What SAS adds at idle depends on the line: 0.18 W on the 7E10, 0.5 W on the standard X10, 0.8 W on the HC510, 0.9 W on the 7E8 and 1.0 W on the HC320. Your hardware still decides, so confirm what your controller or backplane accepts first. Rows with an unread interface are held back from this list.

New drives only, and the recertified ST8000NM000C family

Recertified is a different set of part numbers. Seagate's factory-recertified sheet lists ST8000NM000C, ST8000NM001C and ST8000NM002C at 8 TB, with a limited warranty of 6 months. It also prints 2,400 power-on hours per year, where the new X10 sheet prints 8,760, which matters if a drive will spin all year. Being listed as used on Amazon.co.uk does not prove a drive came through that programme. If you buy as a consumer from a trader, your statutory rights are a separate question from that maker warranty. Our page on refurbished enterprise hard drives goes into it.